Rikitake Kamado Shrine

Rikitake Kamado Shrine

After visiting Nyoirinji Temple, the "Frig Temple" that was number three on the Kyushu pilgrimage I am walking, and the second temple of the day, I carried on roughly SW towards the next temple, and was now walking along the old Nagasaki Highway that connected Nagasaki with Moji.

In the settlement of Rikitake I stopped in at the village shrine which was a branch of Kamado Shrine a little north of here in Dazaifu.

The original Kamado Shrine is said to have been established by Emperor Tenji in 664, on top of the sacred mountain Mount Homan. He moved the political and administrative capital of Kyushu to the base of the mountain, now Dazaifu, as a defensive measure expecting Japan to be attacked by Sila.

More information on his military defeat on the Korean peninsula the year before can be found in some of the posts I did on shrines I visited yesterday further east in Asakura.

Originally it is said he enshrined thousands of kami in Kamado Shrine, though now it is listed as enshrining Tamayorihime, Jingu, and Ojin. A Buddhist priest, Shinren, had a vision of Tamayorihime on Mount Homen a few years after the shrine was originally established.

This branch shrine lists Tamayorihime as the main kami and also lists Yamashita Kagehime and Kora Tamatari, but I can find no information on those two kami.

The shrine did have a small pair of weathered zuijin that were unusual.

Yokoguma Hayabusataka Shrine

Japan Shrines

About one kilometer from the previous shrine, Otoguma Tenmangu, the village shrine in Yokoguma was similar in appearance, being situated within a grove of large trees. However, by crossing a small river to get here  I had entered into a different cultural sphere. Whereas almost all the shrines I had visited earlier were Tenmangu shrines, on this side of the river they turned out to be shrines all connected to the mythical Empress Jingu.

According to the story, Emperor Chuai, considered the last of the "emperors" of the Yayoi period, and who was based here in northern Kyushu rather than the Yamato area, received an omen from the kami Takamimusubi who took the outward form of a bird that alighted on a pine tree before flying off to the north.

Takamimusubi is one of the first group of kami who "came into existence" and who has no stories about him in the ancient myths but is considered in some versions to be a grandfather of Ninigi who later descended from the high plain of heaven to begin the rule over Japan.

After Chuai's death, his consort, later known as Empress Jingu came back to this spot and established the shrine with Takamimusubi as the kami.

Hayabusa, in the name of the shrine, refers to the peregrine falcon, believed to be the bird of the legend. Though the original pine tree has long since gone, a group of three centuries old trees are revered here,

My next stop was the nearby Frog Temple, Nyoirinji, and several of the shrines i visited later were also connected to Jingu.

Japan Shop

Otoguma Tenmangu

 

A copse of tall, old trees rising from the middle of an expanse of fields is often a sure signifier of the location of a shrine.

The banners flying, in this case for the Hatsumode period of the new year is another sign.

Otoguma is another tiny settlement, in southern Fukuoka, and the small local shrine is a mere 250 meters from a neighboring village shrine, Shisojima Tenmangu, and this is yet another Tenmangu.

In 1884 a couple of more kami were added to the shrine. This was a time of great changes in the religious landscape of japan due to the separation of the buddhas and the kami. In 1918 some more were added and this may have been a result of the shrine closure-merger program.

Shisojima Tenmangu

 

Shisojima is a small farming settlement in southern Fukuoka near the Homan River.

The village shrine is yet another Tenmangu, very common in the area as Dazaifu Tenmangu is only about 10 kilometers upstream.

There was a small sumo ring for children, but it looked as if it hadn't been used in a while.

Since the early Meiji period a Shishimai, Lion Dance, has been performed here at the festival in September.

A secondary shrine in the grounds is said to enshrine Gozu Tenno, the original kami enshrined at Gion in what is now known as Yasaka Shrine. Over time Gozutenno became identified with Susano. It is said excavations at the shrine here unearthed evidence of Korean settlement.

Many Tenmangu and Tenjin shrines have a statue of an Ox, deriving from the legend that the location of Sugawara Michizane's tomb ( the current main hall of Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine), was decided by the ox pulling the cart carrying his deceased body.

If you look closely you can see that this komainu is male.......

Nomachi Takano Shrine

Japan Guide

Nomachi is a tiny farm settlement on the flat plain north of the Chikugo River in southern Fukuoka.

The local shrine, adjacent to the community centre is marked by a small stand of tall trees as with many other rural or urban shrines.

The rudimentary shrine building is fairly utilitarian, and there was no signboard explaining which kami were enshrined here.

There was a small Dosojin altar. Dosojin were sometimes placed at village boundaries for protection and were often symbols of marriage and fertility. Sometimes pairs of stones or single phallic stones, later they became carvings of male-females couple in Heian costume.

A small secondary shrine in the grounds was open showing the mirror used as the shintai.

Ushiki Tenmangu

 

Ushiki is a small farming village on the bank of the Koishiwara River that runs from the mountains to the NE down to the Chikugo River. On the opposite bank is the town of Amagi where I had just visited Kotokuin Temple.

Walking west towards the next temple, Nyoirinji, the "Frog Temple", as was my habit I stopped in at any shrines I passed.

Most people would walk right past such a small, local shrine, but I was always on the lookout for interesting and unique artwork like carvings or statues, but also because such shrines have connections to local and national history.

There was nothing unusual in the art of this shrine, but its history throws some light onto a little known aspect of fairly recent "religious" history. This is now a Tenmangu,  enshrining Sugawara Michizane, a national shrine with many bramches, especially in this area. However, local records list it as a Ta shrine, with a couple of obscure kami.

The shrine has a large ancient tree with a couple of small shrines at its base. Interestingly the shintai, the object within the shrine that is inhabited by the kami when it descends, is arge stone. Most sources nowadays stress that shintai are mostly mirrors, though that is very much a modern creation of modern state shinto. Many shintai used to be Buddhist statues, and many small, local shrines, like here, used a stone. The mirror was linked with Amaterasu, the Imperial ancestor who is nowadays said to be central to shinto.

I suspect that this was the original shrine. In the early 20th century the government initiated a program of shrine closures which resulted in half of the shrines in Japan being closed. These were all local, often nature-based shrines with sacred trees. The trees were cut down and sold as lumber and locals were forced to worship at a national shrine.

One way some communities resisted this program was by very quickly enshrining a national kami in the shrine and therefore spared the destruction of the sacred tree. There are examples of this in my own area.

Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine

Ogori Hiyoshi Jinja

Monkeys are the messengers of Hiyoshi shrines, so its not surprising that at the Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine in Ogori, Fukuoka,  there are monkey statues around the grounds.

It is one of almost 4,000 branches around Japan of Hiyoshi Taisha located at the base of Mount Hiei in Shiga.

Before the Meiji period many of the Hiyoshi shrines were called Hie Shrine or Sanno Shrine, as the shrine was based on the Sanno cult, or Mountain King.

The cult was a kami cult based on Tendai Buddhism and the main kami was Oyamakui, and when the imperial court moved to the area temporarily in the late 7th century (in fear of attacks from Korea), Okuninushi was added, though as the area was earlier settled by Korean immigrants there was certainly Korean "kami" in the mix also.

The main building of the Ogori Hiyoshi Shrine had some really nice carvings.

The shrine seemed to be quite popular which usually indicates "this worldly benefits" and several of the monkey statues had babies. There was also a tall tree that had split into two trunks, commonly a symbol of marriage.

There was also a set of statues of the # Wise Monkeys, and while they are not purely of Sanno Shinto origin, several of the strands that make up their origin in Japan have strong Tendai connections.

Nyoirin-ji-Temple-3 on the Kyushu Pilgrimage

 

Temple number 3 on the Kyushu pilgrimage is Nyoirinji in Ogori, southern Fukuoka. Because of how I planned my route I did not visit it until day 55, about three-quarters of my way along the walk.

All 108 temples of the pilgrimage belong to the Shingon sect, one of the 2 ancient esoteric sects, and consequently many of the deities have their roots in Hinduism.

The temple is named after the honzon, a Nyoirin Kannon, the "wish-fulfilling" Kannon, one of 6 main manifestations of Kannon, derived from the word nyoi, the wish-fulfilling jewel.

The honzon here is a "hidden buddha" and is only open to public view every 12 years. It is very unusual because it is standing and most Nyoirin Kannon are seated.

The grounds contain numerous halls and shrines, including this one to Benzaiten.

Founded in the first half of the 8th century by the famous monk Gyoki. Some say he carved the honzon, but other sources say it was much later in the Heian period. The temple was burned down at the emnd of the 16th century but later rebuilt.

I had wanted to speak with the priest as his son had told me that he had walked this pilgrimage,  but it was early January and was very crowded. The temple is also popular in July when the grounds are filled with wind chimes.

The temple is most famous for its collection of thousands of frog statues and has the nickname Frog Temple.

Earlier I posted photos of the many Fudo Myo statues here.